


The Bagelling

by concupiscence66



Category: The Mighty Boosh RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-25 20:16:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4975033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/concupiscence66/pseuds/concupiscence66
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Noel goes out for a bagel and has a tender moment with Julian.  It's a bagelling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bagelling

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bluestocking79](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluestocking79/gifts).



Noel tries to look casual as he internally fumes. All he’d wanted was a nice, fresh bagel with cream cheese, and to sit on a bench and people watch. He could generally walk about Highgate without much fuss, but today a photog had arrived the moment Noel sat down. His options were to be photographed while eating, never a pleasant experience, or to hide in his flat. If he were Julian, it would be different - he’d flip off the camera and make a point of ruining the shot - but Noel is not Julian. If he were, no one would be trying to take pictures of him eating a bagel in the first place. Julian has firmly established himself as a sensible and uncontroversial family man; he could snort coke off a rent boy’s arse and there would be no one to buy the picture. Julian had bitched back in the day about being ignored by the press, but it was the product of Julian’s campaign not to be gossip fodder. Julian’s reward for refusing to make proper eye contact and dressing like a tramp was an enviable degree of privacy now.

Noel had taken a different path, and that path apparently led to being harassed while you ate a bagel. Perhaps the photog hopes that, after eating the bagel, Noel will pull a syringe from his bag and shoot up. Or, better yet, pull Russell Brand from his bag and triple the price of the photo. 

As Noel heads home, he is so lost in his thoughts, he walks past Julian without a glance.

“Noel?”

Noel turns back and feels a giddy rush at the sight of his former comedy partner. Julian is grinning widely and throws out his arms for a hug, but even as Noel steps forward, he can see the awkwardness settling into Julian’s expression. When they hug, there is a poorly coordinated battle to get their arms in the right place, as though they haven’t embraced a million times before. It’s always the same. There’s always something a bit off when they’ve been apart, and they’ve been apart for too long. Noel likes to blame the awkwardness on Julian, but it is truly a joint effort. When he sees Julian, Noel feels like a child on Christmas and reacts with the same level of enthusiasm, but he inevitably worries about being too clingy and pulls back. Julian may not be consciously aware of any of it, but he has always been sensitive to the subtleties of Noel’s body language. That awareness is essential to their chemistry, but poison to their friendship. 

Noel gives Julian a tight hug, but the moment he thinks that it is odd Julian is holding him for so long, Julian pulls back. Double act magic is sometimes a curse.

“I’ve been hoping to run into you,” Julian says with a goofy smile. He looks ready to burst out laughing and Noel feels uncomfortable being left out of the joke.

“Because we live so far apart? You could reach out your window and knock on my door. Last week, you blew Julia a kiss and it landed on my cheek. It was like a butterfly.”

“Like the wind caressing your cheek.”

“Except it was all bristly and had coffee breath.”

“Like a bristly wind caressing your cheek.”

Julian is doing his “romantic poet” face, and Noel is so absorbed that he forgets how they got on the subject of kisses. Julian has always played at wooing Noel with kisses and words of love. The first time Julian put his hand under Noel’s chin and gave him a gentle kiss on the lips, Noel had waited for the laugh or the punch line or some clue that it wasn’t a real kiss. He is still waiting.

“I wanted to run into you while out and about,” Julian explains. “Just a casual encounter.”

“Whoa there, Romeo. You’re going to need to buy me a few drinks before there’s any casual encountering. I’m not some tart…”

“You are such a tart.”

“…not some tart who has casual encounters without at least getting a few free drinks out of it.”

Julian smiles, and he looks so damned happy that Noel loses his train of thought once again. Happiness suits Julian.

“You look good, Ju,” Noel says. It is true, but he’s not sure why he said it out loud.

Julian’s eyes widen and he tightens his lips as though trying not to laugh.

“What’s wrong with you, Julian? You look like you’re having a seizure. I’d put my wallet under your tongue, if I had one. I keep my money in my sock. Should I stick my sock under your tongue?”

“I’ve been wanting to show you my new hairstyle,” Julian explains. Dee had always marveled at the way Julian and Noel made each other laugh. She said they were like children, never ceasing to be entertained by a game of “Peek-a-boo”.

“What did you do?” Noel asks. Julian loves to make himself look as hideous as possible for Noel. He well remembers the first time Julian took off his shirt and forced Noel to look at the burn scars on his shoulders. Noel had pulled away and squealed as though the scars were in fact horrible and spent the rest of the night wide awake and very, very confused. It was the first of many half-naked tangles with Julian, and the first of many sleepless nights.

Julian looks a bit shy as his lifts his trilby to reveal a truly horrific sight. The top of Julian’s head is completely bald, which by itself would not be so bad. Julian had always looked good in his baldcap when playing Dennis the Head Shaman, after all. It was the close-cropped curls on the side of Julian’s head that were unbearable. Julian had always been able to at least somewhat get away with his awful clothing choices because of his boy band meets mad scientist hair. The more Noel fawned over the soft curls, the more Julian tried to form them into something hideous. 

“Why?” Noel wails, pretending to go weak in the knees. “I told you jazz music would turn you into a middle aged banker! Why didn’t you listen?”

Julian blushes and runs a hand over his smooth head. “I thought I looked like Kojak. I was thinking of getting a lolly to suck on.”

Noel feels himself going red, but he can’t come up with a line fast enough to break the tension. “I’m… honestly horrified. I hope you’re happy.”

Julian laughs and scuffs his shoe on the ground like a child and admits, “Yes. I am.”

“Why would you do this to me?”

“For the same reason I put a frog in Elizabeth Scott’s purse when I was twelve.”

“Because you’re a psycho?”

Julian shrugs. “I think of myself as an eccentric romantic.”

“When your real hair grows back, people will think it’s a toupee.”

Julian laughs uproariously at the suggestion and Noel can see the perverse joy his friend takes in looking his worst. 

“Why do you do these things, Julian?” Noel asks. It is a rhetorical question, but he honestly wonders. Noel will do anything for a laugh, including looking like a pink testicle, but he’ll never understand this particular quirk of Julian’s.

“It’s for the movie,” Julian says, his lips twitching in amusement. “I thought it would be easier than a bald cap. I was so wrong. This is so much harder to maintain than I expected.”

Noel reaches up and slides his fingers under the brim of the hat, feeling the smooth skin underneath. As he does it, he belatedly realizes it is an oddly intimate gesture. Julian stares at Noel’s hand, but looks away when Noel begins to feel awkward. The double act magic is a double edged sword. 

“I hope you’re satisfied. I’m traumatized for life. I need to go climb into a bath with all my clothes on and sing nursery rhymes to myself.”

Julian tilts his head and gives one of his sweet, eye crinkling smiles, and Noel wants to give him another hug, but he doesn’t want to ask for too much. He’s always asking for too much.

“I’d better get home before the boys do,” Julian says with a rueful expression. “It was good seeing you.”

Noel goes for the goodbye hug, because he doesn’t see Julian often enough to play cool. He breathes in the smell of fatherhood and laundry detergent and tries not to react when Julian presses his lips to Noel’s cheek. He gives Julian a quick peck, annoyed with himself for being so caught up in his self-monitoring that he cannot simply enjoy his brief time with Julian. Julian may have found spending months at a time together to be too much, but that was when Noel felt the most at ease with his partner: when there was no room or time for privacy or personal space. When a peck on the cheek could lead to full-on snogging and the term ‘platonic’ could be stretched to its absolute breaking point.

“It was… disturbing to see you. Freak.”

Julian gives a satisfied smile and ruffles Noel’s hair. Noel indulges his partner as he has so many times before. He might not even run to a mirror when Julian is out of sight, because Noel has grown out of feeling so protective of his appearance. More or less.

When Julian kisses him again, it is on the mouth and all-too-brief. Then Julian is giving Noel an awkward half-salute and heading home. Noel pauses for a moment to collect himself. He feels a bit shaky and weak in the knees. By the time he’s given Julian enough time to walk away without them accidentally seeing one another again and having to do yet another good-bye, Noel has almost convinced himself that his wobbliness is simply from hunger. He starts walking home with his surely cold bagel; as he turns the corner, he hears his name and instinctively looks up, just in time to be blinded by the flash of a camera. 

The streets are apparently crawling with people who want a picture of Noel Fielding eating a bagel.


End file.
